Beverages are usually sold to consumers in containers such as glass or plastic bottles; aluminium or steel cans; cardboard or plastic cartons; or casks which include a bladder housed in a cardboard box.
Consumers currently have the choice of either drinking directly from the containers mentioned above, or transferring the liquid contained therein to a drinking glass for consumption therefrom. Many consumers prefer to drink certain types of beverages from a drinking glass with a wide mouth to enhance the aroma and therefore the flavour of the beverage.
Apart from drinking glasses, most drink containers have no worth once their contents are consumed other than perhaps as part of a recycling program. Consequently, most drink containers are simply discarded and are never recycled. Therefore, there is often a lot of domestic and industrial waste associated with the use of drink containers other than drinking glasses.
A problem with the use of drinking glasses however, particularly in the hospitality industry, is that viral and bacterial illnesses (such as hepatitis B and C, and influenza, amongst others) can be spread by the continual and frequent reuse of glasses despite the fact that the glasses are required by health codes to be washed at sterilising temperatures (typically over 80 degrees centigrade) prior to being reused.
Moreover, the provision of drinking glasses in the hospitality industry is a significant expense to many businesses in the industry for a number of reasons. Firstly, particularly in climates where beer and other drinks need to be served ice cold and where drinking glasses are therefore chilled before use, there can be significant refrigeration costs associated with chilling drinking glasses. This is because a significant amount of refrigerator space often needs to be dedicated to not only the containers in which the beverages are stored, but also to the empty drinking glasses. Also, in cases where above-bench glass chillers which chill drinking glasses by passing chilled water through the glass are used, significant costs are incurred in the purchase, installation, running costs, and maintenance of such glass chillers, to which beverage is to be poured prior to consumption.
Secondly, there are significant costs associated with purchasing drinking glasses at the outset and purchasing replacement glasses due to breakages and other mishaps.
Thirdly, the costs associated with cleaning used drinking glasses are a significant component of many businesses in the hospitality industry. These cleaning costs include the labour, chemical, hot water, and electrical costs which are associated with collecting, racking, washing and drying glasses.
Lastly, beverage companies who supply the hospitality industry with their beverages in bottles or other containers apart from drinking glasses, often also supply pubs, nightclubs and other venues with free branded drinking glasses for dispensing their product in. The cost to beverage companies of providing the drinking glasses is usually factored into their promotional glassware budgets and can be significant.
Another problem with the use of drinking glasses is that the beverage contained therein can be easily spiked with alcohol or another drug without the knowledge of the consumer. It would therefore be desirable to have a drinking glass which at least reduces the possibility of the beverage contained therein being spiked.
Furthermore, the surfaces of drinking glasses which are usually contacted by the mouths and lips of consumers are exposed and are therefore susceptible to being contaminated by unclean hands, for example. It would therefore be beneficial to have a drinking glass which reduces the possibility of the aforementioned drinking glass surfaces being contaminated.
Various attempts have been made to provide a beverage container (such as a drinking glass) which may overcome at least some of the above-mentioned disadvantages.
For instance, it is known to provide a drinking glass that contains a removable lid for sealing purposes and where the lid can be removed prior to consumption. However, there are difficulties with proper attachment of the lid to the glass and which have not been overcome by the known methods.
One difficulty is that some seals or removable lids merely extend over the top of the rim of the drinking glass. When the lid is removed (this being particularly the case for lids that are glued or similarly attached to the glass) an adhesive residue can remain behind which is unsuitable if the adhesive residue is on the rim of the glass. WO96/05123 describes such an arrangement.
Also, the surface area of the rim of the glass is relatively small and therefore there are difficulties in providing a proper seal especially if it is desirable to store a carbonated beverage in the glass in which case the seal needs to be pressure resistant.
For this reason, it is known to provide a lid that simply screws over the top of a drinking glass. This provides a good seal and makes the glass pressure tight. However, the arrangement does require a thread to be provided on the upper surface of the drinking glass and this increases the manufacturing cost of the glass, can be an encumbrance to drinkers (with the thread being very close to the rim of the glass), and the thread can be quite easily broken or damaged to present a sharp edge. This arrangement is described in German patent specification 202 05239.
Another attempt to overcome the attachment difficulties of the removable seal with the glass rim is to provide the rim with an outwardly extending peripheral flange. While this increases the surface area and therefore provides a better attachment of the seal with the rim, the outwardly extending flange makes drinking more difficult. Also, the flange is usually relatively thin and therefore brittle and is prone to being broken or cracked to produce sharp edges that can cause serious injury. This type of arrangement is described in international patent application WO96/05123.
Another disadvantage with attachment of lids to drinking vessels containing a beverage (such as wine), is that if the vessel is shaken or knocked during the lid fitting process, the wine can spill onto the rim of the vessel which can greatly reduce sealing efficiency of the lid to the rim. For this reason, it is also known to provide a specially designed wine glass which contains an opening in the bottom of the stem and which is filled from the bottom. In this way, the lid can be attached to the empty wine glass and the wine can then be filled through the stem. A stopper is required to ensure that the wine does not leak through the stem. This arrangement is quite complicated and would have high manufacturing costs. EP 309314 describes this arrangement.
Another attempt to provide a simple solution to the above disadvantages is to provide a lid or seal that overlies the rim of the glass and which extends partially down the side wall of the glass. An advantage of this type of seal is that there is no need to provide glue or other adhesive on the rim. Instead, the adhesive can be applied to the outer side wall of the glass and below the top rim. Also, by extending over the rim and down the side wall of the glass, the rim is protected against contamination prior to consumption of the wine (or other beverage) in the glass.
However, a disadvantage with this type of seal is that in practice, it is found that the seal can still inadvertently be removed from the glass and if the glass contains a pressurised beverage, the pressure tightness of the seal is not as good as it could be which means that the beverage in the glass can go flat prior to consumption. While a solution might be to simply make the seal extend further down the wall of the glass, it is found that there is a consumer advantage in being able to view the contents of the glass without the view being occluded by the seal. Also, the manufacturing cost increases. As well, when the seal is removed, any adhesive on the side wall of the glass can remain tacky which is undesirable to people holding the glass. Attempting to attach a seal without adhesive is problematic with this design of glass as there is no proper “purchase” or attachment position of the seal to the glass due to the relatively smooth nature of the glass. Thus, this type of seal can be quite unsuitable for use with pressurised or carbonated beverages.
Another disadvantage or problem with many of the known types of seals or lids is that it is often quite difficult to remove the lid or seal from the glass without spilling or upsetting the contents of the glass, this being mainly caused by the rather aggressive nature of the adhesive. Thus, there would be an advantage if it were possible to provide a seal or lid with some form of construction or design that would make removal of the lid simpler.
A difficulty in attempting to provide a removable seal or lid over a drinking vessel is that the mouth of the drinking vessel (e.g. wine glass) is quite large compared to the main body of the vessel. For pressurised systems, the force acting on the lid or seal can be calculated by the equation Force=Pressure×Area. Thus, for relatively narrow necked containers such as beer bottles, the force on the beer bottle cap is relatively low. However, for larger open mouthed glasses and similar vessels (for instance, to accommodate a carbonated beverage), the amount of force on the seal will be much larger.
There would be an advantage if it were possible to provide a removable seal or lid for a drinking vessel such as a glass and which could protect the rim of the glass against contamination, which could enable a pressurised beverage to be contained within the glass for longer, and which would have a reduced possibility of delaminating from the glass.